I’m a doctor and I play one on the Internet. Not an MD mind you, but a PhD. I have a dual concentration Metallurgy and Biomedical Engineering. I bring this up not for braggadocio but for credentials. So when I touch on matters of biomechanics, anatomy, and physiology, I am speaking with some level of authority.
In one of Miguel’s previous posts he quoted from some CSGV blowhard (emphasis mine):
“They are so terrified of having a simple physical confrontation (i.e., shoving match, fistfight)–and so bitter about what it might do to their pride and reputation if they come out on the losing side of the equation–that they would rather shoot and kill another human being than stand up and face that situation (which frequently is of their own making).”
I’ll admit it, I am terrified of getting into a fistfight. I’m not gonna take it outside. I’m not gonna settle it like a man. I will do everything I can to avoid a fight, and if that means I have to shoot you, guess what, I’m gonna shoot you (which believe me, I’d much rather not).
Here is why, in three words, I do not want to get into a fistfight: Traumatic Brain Injury. The human brain is made up of relatively inelastic tissue, neurons and capillaries. The brain sits in a sack of fluid called the dura matter. This is inside the skull. When you take a punch to the head, your head goes from still to moving very quickly. This linear and rotational acceleration causes the brain to smash around inside of your skull like dice in a shaker.
Every time your brain hits skull, it stretches. When your brain stretches it tears, neurons rip away from each other and capillarities rupture. Your brain starts to bleed. Blood collects in the spongy tissue of the brain compressing it. The brain starts to swell, squeezing it inside of the skull. This compression and the torn blood vessels causes a loss of blood flow to regions of the brain. Without blood, there is no oxygen, without oxygen, parts of the brain shut down. Long enough without oxygen, the brain dies. When the brain dies, so do you.
A solid punch can cause your brain to smack around inside your skull with the force of a high speed car accident. And no, it doesn’t take a professional boxer to kill with with a punch.
I like my brain. I spend long enough in school stuffing it full of facts. I’m not going to let somebody try an kill it to prove my manliness. Assuming that I survive, of course, it would me nice to still be able to come away remembering how to do math, or even my kid’s name.
So no. I’m not going to fight you. I really don’t want to. It’s not so much that I’m a yellow bellied chicken. I just don’t feel like having my neurons torn apart to prove to you that I’m a man.
CSGV is a runoff pooling-ground for submissive, compliant and obedient victims who mistake mutual combat for self defense.
Members have zero ability to legally articulate their State’s law on scaling of force in self defense. And they have zero tactical training in self defense. Acutally putting the two together on only acting legally where they intersect? Way beyond their pay grade.
They are histrionic emotional and project that onto law abiding gun owners and the inanimate guns themselves.
More power to Miguel for reading that site. I cant do it.
“I’ll admit it, I am terrified of getting into a fistfight. I’m not gonna take it outside. I’m not gonna settle it like a man. I will do everything I can to avoid a fight, and if that means I have to shoot you, guess what, I’m gonna shoot you (which believe me, I’d much rather not).”
Speaking as a lowly EMT with 20 years of practical experience, I concur!
BTW, I will also try to run away first, considering no one else is in my care.
“More power to Miguel for reading that site. I cant do it.”
Agreed. I just went there and was overwhelmed by the emotional stupidity, bigotry, and childishness. Was like being back on my 4th grade playground.
And let’s not forget, the worst part of getting knocked down in a fight isn’t the fist hitting your head, it’s your head hitting the asphalt.
Spot on! And also think of the secondary trauma – get hit in the head and have an uncontrolled fall whether due to unconsciousness or rapidity- and have your head hit something much harder and sharper can end in death or or very long time in rehab re-learning how to walk and talk.
Someone preparing to throw a punch at another person should be appropriately viewed as imminently life-threatening behavior.
A question for our bioengineer – assuming a male about 6ft tall takes a blow to the head that knocks him out, what is the force of his head (assuming an simple arc to the floor rather than cumpling knees) when it hits the floor and comes to a sudden stop compared to the force needed to crumple a skull? My money is on the floor….
This line here: “(which frequently is of their own making)”
In their minds, firearm owners are psychotically aggressive (because that’s what they would be like w/ guns) so all those fights are obviously started by them and therefore they are deserving of whatever happens.
They have no actual evidence to support this belief but they will regurgitate it endlessly as ‘proof’.
Metallurgy *and* Biomedical engineering? So you’re the guy to talk to about cybernetic implants.
More seriously, so maybe we should start issuing open challenges to CSGV members for the Knockout Game? No guns are involved, it’s obviously harmless. In exchange for allowing me one free punch, I’d be willing to reconsider my stance on firearm ownership.
You know. Unless they’re cowards.
Medical implants is what I did my dissertation in. I didn’t so the circuitry of the the cybernetics. My research was in how to get bone and soft tissue to stick to the implant so it attaches permanently and is more load bearing than today’s slip-on-over-the-stump designs.
My fisticuffs days are in the past. My being able to
run awayretreat days are now gone as well. If the choice is them or me, I am going to do my best to make sure it’s them, and a pistol is my best chance for ensuring my continued existence.Ya know, sometimes you read something that makes you look really hard at not only what you believe, but why.
Thank you J. KB for this post. Now I can rest easy if I ever have to shoot some scumbag who wishes to turn my brain into a soccer ball.
It’s kind of fascinating that a group which claims to be anti-violence seems to just LOVE the idea of ‘shoving matches’ and fistfights.
One of the best pieces I’ve seen expressing the rationale that also keeps me from fighting physically (unless I have no other choice). Thanks for expressing it so well!